RA's Greyhawk Setting Bible
__TOC__ Not to be pretentious, but the rules for D&D are like Aristotle's Poetics, if you will. They tell me how to put together a good play. And a referee is the playwright who reads these things and puts his play together. - Gary Gygax, creator of Dungeons and Dragons, in Shared Fantasy, pg. 88 =RA's Greyhawk Setting Bible= You're supposed to be providing entertainment for yourself and all of your players, so I don't allow arguments at all, and sometimes players will show me my own rules and say, "Look, it says this in the book," and I say, "Who cares? I just told you otherwise. It doesn't make any difference what the book says." - Gary Gygax, in Shared Fantasy, pg. 111 For new players: http://divisionnihil.blogspot.com/2011/07/shared-fantasy-chapter-6.html RA’s WORLD OF GREYHAWK IS A WORLD NOT JUST A SETTING Whether you are new to role-playing games (RPGs) or a veteran of the recent rule-filled editions of Dungeons and Dragons, it is important to be aware that the specific rubrics of this campaign are fashioned by the Dungeon Master (DM). The rulebooks advise the DM but unlike any other game, the rulebooks for this RPG (in this case Dungeons & Dragons version 3.5) are suggestions and not the ultimate authority. This is what is called the Old School Renaissance and it is what will be played. New people without any experience playing RPGs are welcome. Ironically, it will be new players who have an easy time accepting this reality and it will be veterans, with preconceived truths established in other gamers, who may have a difficulty time patiently exploring the game world and the natural laws operant within it. Veterans are advised to forget all they believe they know about everything ever published about the setting of Greyhawk and its history; the classes and capabilities of the “Races of Men;” the conceptual framework of magic; and the flavour and crunch of game mechanics. For example, Leveling Up: to improve and progress in capability, all characters need a mentor. This ruling affects the understanding of the world and its people, and it changes the mechanics of the published rules. New players will accept this without the personal baggage a veteran might bring. All Players Characters (PCs) start at level 1, and all players will start with a fundamental lack of knowledge of my world of Greyhawk that will require player as well as PC exploration. YOUR DM All my extra work creating a unique experience is connected to my enjoyment of the game as the DM. I want players to interact with me and immerse themselves into my world and non-player characters (NPCs) rather than the rules. In this way, I play too. For example, Mentors act as a source of wisdom and intelligence about the world for the PCs. NPCs will not advise PCs, except as a Mentor in the Leveling Up game mechanic. They will present information from a bias of selective perception. PCs (and players) would do well to listen for the bias in Mentors. I bring NPCs to life too. I am a DM to exercise and expand the limits of my creativity. A table full of players will motivate me to prepare and present consistently creative plots to a deadline. The PCs spontaneous and unscripted actions offer me problem-solving insight, which I will use in my other creative projects. (I am writing a fantasy novel.) These insights cannot be had from simple dice rolling or rules officiating. When players enjoy the plots I take time to create and overcome or circumvent the challenges I place before them, I have fun. The game’s element of risk makes success very satisfying to play. My games will not be easy for PCs to survive and success will depend on player common sense more than dice rolling. What is the best common sense advice? Know your world! YOUR WORLD ENVIRONMENT The term from the rulebook for my world is “status quo.” It is not a world that will typically allow a low-level character to defeat a high level adversary, or a world filled only by challenge-level appropriate adversaries. This is not the status quo in life either. So to mirror reality, my world is not a place where adversaries wear “kick me” signs to help PCs. If the adversary looks dangerous, has a well-earned reputation and takes high-level precautions beyond a PCs level, it is safe to say the PCs should stay away. My world is a dangerous place where the stupid often win Darwin Awards (and the dice are not cheated). There will always be in-game information, typically rumours, available to help PCs make intelligent choices of knowing when to fight and when to take flight. As in real life, the natural common sense laws of physics apply. My world is a place where villains can be and are beaten by a swarm of hundreds of angry villagers. The fact that every villain is not regularly beaten by a mob of angry villagers has more to do with villager cowardice than anything else. But even here, as in life, there is a balance between craven cowardice and the recklessness of villagers with nothing to lose. So even villains dare not tip the scale too far, if they have common sense. Gathering information will be crucial in identifying equipment and valuables, avoiding poisoning from food or from experimenting with potion tasting, and walking into traps. Such things as field guides (if the PC can read), town sages, and a 10-foot pole can be very handy. This can be uncommon knowledge to veteran players in my world. It will enhance the interaction with the world, both environment and those who inhabit it, as well as increase opportunities to role-play. YOUR ROLE PLAYING EXPERIENCE If automatically rolling dice is your main thrill, this RPG experience will undoubtedly disappoint. There will be plenty of risk-taking opportunities for PCs requiring the rolling of dice to determine chance however. The use of mundane skills and combat actions will play essential parts in the life of PCs. But so will information. Information will not be a rolled skill, unless it is for PCs to recall information already given in game. For example, Rumours shall only be collected from NPCs in-game. This means PCs will need to have actual conversations with NPCs to learn about rumours. A Sense Motive Skill Check can be rolled to detect an NPC’s agenda, but actually discussing the rumour with NPCs will give a much better indication about how accurate is the information in the rumour. An NPC may be misinformed for any number of reasons that a successful Sense Motive Skill Check will not reveal. Likewise, rolling a Knowledge Skill Check will be unhelpful if there is no Knowledge in the first place – a mentor can certainly help here! Players will not be required to remember months of hints and clues. In such cases where knowledge (including hints, clues and unverified rumours) has been accessed by PCs, a Knowledge Skill Check will act as a memory check. Your DM has all this stuff written down and at his fingertips. This should add a little more importance to having a literate PC visit a bookstore once in a while. TECHNOLOGY There is one absolute rule in sword and sorcery games: NO GUNPOWDER. But there is a great amount of leeway for a fantasy world in terms of technological progress without the invention of gunpowder. A few examples of technology include: wristwatches and mechanical timepieces, crude balloons, the Gutenberg press, spyglasses, Morse code, looms, winches and pulleys, windmills, indoor plumbing, aqueducts, crude steam powered engines, central heating, and electricity. Not every country will have access to every technology. And this includes the technology of commerce. Some countries will trade in raw materials. Other will trade in minted coins. Some will trade in legal tender paper currency. An individual country’s progress in the areas of Banking, Science and Education will inform both player and PC about the nature of each country. Describe your topic Write a description about your topic. Let your readers know what your topic is about and add some general information about it. 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